Seven al-Shabab militants killed after prison attack in Mogadishu

Somali security forces on Sunday said they had killed seven al-Shabab militants who stormed a high-security prison in Mogadishu. 

The government said all the attackers were killed following their six-hour siege. 

On Saturday, the al-Qaeda–linked al-Shabab group attacked the Godka Jilacow prison complex, which is located near the presidential palace in the capital. 

Explosions and gunfire were heard coming from Godka Jilacow on Saturday evening.

"We thank God for sparing us from this disaster. We fled the explosion and the skirmishes as soon as they began," said witness Halima Hassan.

Godka Jilacow is operated by Somalia’s National Intelligence and Security Agency and is one of the most protected sites of the capital. 

Militants disguised themselves as soldiers to enter the prison. Al-Shabab said it wanted to liberate some of its members but the Somali government said no prisoners escaped during the attack. 

The exact number of casualties among security forces was not immediately clear. A private ambulance owner, Abdulkadir Adam, said his vehicles had transported almost 25 patients from the scene to various hospitals.

Saturday’s attack came just hours after the federal government lifted several long-standing roadblocks in Mogadishu. The barriers had been in place for years to safeguard critical government sites, but many residents argued that they obstructed traffic and commerce.

Mogadishu had been relatively calm in recent months as government forces, backed by local militias and African Union troops, pushed al-Shabab fighters out of several areas in central and southern Somalia.

The African Union Support and Stabilization Mission in Somalia condemned the assault on Godka Jilacow as "cowardly."

“This attack once again demonstrates the group’s utter disregard for human life and its attempts to reverse the hard-won gains in peace and security," the Special Representative of the Chairperson of the African Union Commission for Somalia, Ambassador El Hadji Ibrahima Diene, said in a statement.